A Lesson from Dr. Subramaniam Swamy to Sri Lanka’s minority Tamils and MuslimsPosted on August 21st, 2014

Shenali D Waduge

Known for his candid demeanor and straight talk, Dr. Subramaniam Swamy did not mince his words during his eagerly awaited speech at the 4th consecutive Defense Seminar held at the Galadari Hotel from 18-20th August 2014. Encapsulating the gist of Dr. Swamy’s message was the need for minorities in particular the Sri Lankan Tamils to become stakeholders of the Sri Lankan nation and not think themselves separate entities needlessly inclined towards voting for their own only or expecting and appealing for external parties to come to their aid.

What was made clear through reference to Rajiv Gandhi was that India today acknowledged the ‘mistake’ his mother Indira Gandhi made in training and aiding Sri Lankan militancy that gave birth to a host of armed Tamil movements which ultimately ended up with LTTE after LTTE had killed off all the other leaders.

Acknowledged also was that today India under Modi is happy that LTTE is no more and India is happy that Sri Lanka took the decision to ‘fight to finish’ a victory that provided ‘security for India’ that culminated in the end of the LTTE except for what Dr. Swamy termed as the ‘financial orphans’ who need to once in a while cough LTTE ideology to get allocations from the LTTE kitty now involved in numerous other international illegalities.

The next part of Dr. Swamy’s speech alluded to the elections that enabled a clear majority and established how the unification of the Hindu majority could create an outright majority. The lesson in this for minorities was very simple.

In continuously self-alienating, complaining of what is not given against not appreciating what is enjoyed, demanding what cannot be given, looking from the lens of rights without responsibilities the insinuation implied was that in the event the majority unites not only will the minorities become insignificant, the external players that have preyed upon the minorities for their own agendas will also walk away having realized that they are now irrelevant.

In what can be described as an excellent piece of advice to the minorities and relevant to both India and Sri Lanka, Dr. Swamy’s request for minorities to become stakeholders and to think strategically and not emotionally or ethnically is important and minority leaders are best advised to realize the new dynamics at play.

Expanding what Sri Lanka can accept as the new Modi doctrine is the new path that India espouses to take wherein India’s national interests would not bow down to narrow local interests. Honorable as this new shift is, the Indian Central Government reaction and action following a graphic that appeared on a Sri Lankan Government website for which an immediate apology was offered and yet for over a week an unwarranted show of misbehavior was allowed certainly questions the manner India’s Central Government remains to be haunted by State theatrics. Nevertheless, the fact that India has announced a new shift in its policy elevating itself to a newer plane has to be appreciated and commended.

India will not support a separate Tamil country

India will not come to Tamil’s defense

The most important message that Tamils need to take from Dr. Swamy’s speech was that India will not support the notion of Tamils as a separate entity. Expanding further Dr. Swamy requested Tamils not to expect India to come to the defense of Tamils. Essentially, what Sri Lanka’s Tamils need to now think is that they are not part of Tamil Nadu or India but part of the fabric of Sri Lanka. They would need to break away from the psychology that India or Tamil Nadu can come to the defense of Sri Lankan Tamils. If India’s stand on this is as Dr. Swamy projected, India would need to ensure that statements from the Centre, its officials and even State Governments do not give a different meaning or indication that India’s interests continue to rest with the Sri Lankan Tamils. Therefore, just as important as delivering the message, it would be good for Dr Swamy to ensure that India means what it says.

In drawing reference to himself as a Tamil, Dr. Swamy expressed that neither Karunanidhi nor Vaiko were Tamils but from Andhra Pradadesh and that even the Tamils of Sri Lanka were originally from Kerala/Malayali.

In drawing an example from the Presidential election, Dr. Swamy explained how he could not understand the mentality of the Northern Tamils in their argument of claiming genocide by the Sri Lankan Government while choosing as common candidate the former Army Commander and voting for him. He expanded this further in the manner how the Sri Lankan President had invited the Northern Chief Minister to accompany him to Mr. Modi’s oath ceremony but Chief Minister Wigneswaran had declined because he did not wish to accompany the President of Sri Lanka but as Dr. Swamy said the Chief Minister’s psychology was part of the problem – he was not a head of a sovereign state and should not think so either!

Thus, from the speech by Dr. Swamy, himself a Tamil, what was made abundantly clear was that the Tamils need to urgently shift their current psychology towards looking at themselves as part of the Sri Lankan family and not thinking that they are a separate entity.

Tamils of Sri Lanka are well advised to realize that with the pace with which the economic development cutting across Asia is taking place and the geopolitical security emphasis, India is now unwilling to be bogged down by domestic petty politics that have no nation-wide significance for India.

Before Tamils become irrelevant by their own actions, a lesson for Sri Lanka’s Muslims who are being taken down the same mistaken path that the Tamils first embarked on, it is no better a time for both the minorities to realize that instead of self-alienating themselves by their actions and inactions, they need to become stakeholders.

The minorities need to now think themselves as Sri Lankans putting their ethno-religious inclinations to the background and this holds the key to peaceful co-existence. Dr. Swamy showed how the unification of the Hindu majority in India at the recent election displayed that until and unless the minorities become part of the governing cycle and desiring to be part of the country’s historical heritage they would by their own actions become irrelevant with time and this is not a path that the minorities should take. The greater lesson is that external parties are ever ready to pitch in to aggravate mischief if and when they see a window of opportunity to create the destabilizing plots to their advantage, when they realize there are no windows of opportunity they would abandon the very minorities that they used like a ton of bricks. This was the bitter lesson Saddam Hussein, Gaddafi and Osama bin Laden learnt. In the larger game of politics it is nothing but a game of being used and discarded after use.

The stand on the UNHRC investigation was also made clear by Dr. Swamy who said that India would not accept anything ‘intrusive’ and highlighted the imbalance with which the investigation was being done with LTTE only given a peripheral mention in all reports.

With India’s stand clear on UNHRC investigation, the need for Tamils to think and belong to Sri Lanka instead of thinking themselves as belonging to a separate state however looks to be a distant dream so long as Tamils allow entities like the Tamil National Alliance to drag them towards self-alienation and irrelevance.

The best example of this is the manner that 33 TNA provincial councilors have written to the UNHRC outgoing head Navi Pillai to expand the UNHRC war crimes to include the atrocities committed by SLFP and UNP Governments since 1974 to determine that genocide was committed. When Sinhalese and Muslims have been killed in their thousands there are no grounds for genocide which even Dr. Swamy mentioned in his speech. Nevertheless, the TNA demand has reverse repercussions for it includes virtually all of LTTE’s crimes and would also help to confirm and establish the LTTE-TNA link and thus with the LTTE ground leadership no more it would certainly help establish the argument that if LTTE is found guilty of crimes the TNA leadership must take accountability.

There is much for the minorities to ponder over amongst themselves and the need to delink themselves from ethno-religious minority political parties is a good starting point for these parties funded by mischief operators will take the ordinary people to devastation as can be seen in other parts of the world.

SW has referred to the bitter lessons that Saddam Hussein, Gaddafi and Bin Laden learned from depending on external parties. They are not alone in this. The Indo Sri Lanka Accord of 1987 is a classic case in point, in this context. The only real beneficiary from it was India who got among other things, privileged access to the Trincomalee harbour, a say over what SL does with the Palaly airport, in defence matters and so on. The Accord did not benefit either the LTTE or the GOSL. As far as SL is concerned it even left a legacy of a lingering sore with 13A.

But it seems the wise men in the North have learnt nothing. They still want external intervention, a path along which some Muslim politicians also now seem keen to travel.

Subramaniam Swamy is a Tamil. But he was not elected by Tamils in recent past. In 2004 he LOST Madurai electorate coming LAST with only 12,000 votes.

He studied in Harvard, USA and in 1977 he spied on Endia for USA and gave USA Indira Ghandhi’s election strategy. During this time Endia and Ghandhi were pro-Russian.

Although he is the BEST of all Tamils, I find it difficult to TRUST him.

What does he say about UNITARY SL and 13 amendment? If he does not support UNITARY SL or supports 13 amendment, he is another Endian junk we should be careful of. He stands for ENDIAN interests which is BETTER than standing for Tamil interests. But SL interests must come first.

MORE TREASON from the Tiger Nominated Agents of the TNA, now attempting to PERSUADE Indian Leaders to give them the EELAM Bantustan through TREASON in PEACE that they FAILED to win by VIOLENCE in murderous war!

When are we going to PUNISH these TRAITORS for PLOTTING AGAINST THEIR OWN COUNTRY with foreigners?

When?

REPEAL the 13th Amendment, DISSOLVE the Provincial Councils, Ethnically Integrate all of Sri Lanka, not just the South of the Country!

…………………………Sri Lanka Tamil party delegation visits India to seek solutions to national issue

ColomboPage News Desk, Sri Lanka.

Aug 21, Colombo: A five-member delegation of Sri Lanka’s major Tamil party, Tamil National Alliance (TNA), will leave for India today to hold discussions with the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and other senior Indian leaders on a host of issues.

The TNA delegation, led by its leader MP R. Sampanthan, will meet Prime Minister Modi in New Delhi on August 23.

This is the first meeting the party will have with the new Indian PM and his government after the Chief Minister of Northern Province C. V. Wigneswaran turned down an invitation to accompany Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa to the swearing-in ceremony of Modi in May this year.

During the meeting with the Prime Minister, the TNA delegation is expected to raise the issue of power devolution under the 13th Amendment to the Constitution and host of other issues including the demilitarization of North.

Following the TNA’s victory in the Northern Province last September and gaining power in the Provincial Council, the party has demanded the Sri Lankan government grant police and land powers to the Province.

The Sri Lankan government has made it clear that devolving police powers to provincial councils is not acceptable saying that it is not the policy of the government to provide police powers to any provincial council in the country.

The Sri Lankan government says that it would resort to a power devolution process or introduce constitutional changes only through a Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) with an extensive political interaction with all political parties and other stakeholders to discuss all the issues related to power devolution, police and land powers to PCs and security issues of the provinces.

However, the TNA has refused to take part in the PSC despite the requests from the government as well as from foreign leaders to do so.

“In the present context of Sri Lanka, the 13th Amendment itself is irrelevant.”

R” it was enacted to facilitate the LTTE to enter mainstream politics, adding that EPRLF, EROS, PLOT, TELO, etc all entered mainstream politics through it.”

Furthermore, he says …

“India is organized on the basis of ethno-linguistic states. Sri Lanka is too small to do that. The Sri Lankan model should be that everyone should be able to live at anyplace preserving their own cultural and ethnic identities. India’s solution is good for India. It is not conducive or healthy for our country,” he said.

We are happy to have the esteemed professor join now the vast majority of patriots who have been saying this for DECADES!

The ethno-linguistic organization of India will ultimately lead to its disintegration. The growing ethno-linguistic warfare between Assam and Hagaland right now is further proof of that. Sri Lanka should not hoist upon its own head the same crown of thorns that India is suffering from, blessed as Sri Lanka is with a size small enough a federal structure of government unnecessary and irrelevant.

The situation today is that the TNA wants the Northern Province to be an EXCLUSIVE Tamils-Only preserve, while SHARING the rest of Sri Lanka as “Sri Lankan citizens” that they barely honor. That must not be allowed. The Provincial Council system under the 13th Amendment is what will allow them to achieve it. The TNA’s ULTIMATE GOAL of EELAM has not veered ONE IOTA from the GOAL OF EELAM it pursued vociferously in the days when the late unlamented Sun God ruled the Northern Province, and the TNA represented him as the LTTE proxy in Colombo.

Why are we still DEBATING this OBVIOUS issue? The 13th Amendment and the Provincial Council System is a dagger pointed at the heart of the territorial integrity and economic progress in our Motherland. With India itself, under the Narendra Modi BJP Govt, recognizing its culpability for inciting separatism within Sri Lanka (vide Dr. Subramaniam Swamy’s recent remarks in Colombo) and willing to MAKE AMENDS to establish amicable relations with Sri Lanka, Sri Lanka should SEIZE the DAY and …

REPEAL the 13th Amendment, DISSOLVE the Provincial Councils, Ethnically Integrate all of Sri Lanka, not just the South of the Country!

CARPE’ DIEM, I say! Ask not for whom the bell tolls … it tolls for our Motherland of Sri Lanka

………Prof. Rohan Gunaratne at special lecture in Parliament: Home-grown solution best for Sri Lanka

By Sandasen Marasinghe and Disna Mudalige
DailyNews.lk
August 22, 2014

In the present context of Sri Lanka, the 13th Amendment itself is irrelevant, Expert on International Terrorism Prof. Rohan Gunaratne said.

He was making a special lecture on “India under Modi: A turning point in Indo-Lanka Relations” at the Parliamentary complex yesterday. The event was organized by the Sri Lanka Parliamentary Journalists’ Association with the coordination of the Department of Government Information.

Responding to a question by a journalist on the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, he said it was enacted to facilitate the LTTE to enter mainstream politics, adding that EPRLF, EROS, PLOT, TELO, etc all entered mainstream politics through it.

He said now is the best time to reflect on the suitability of 13th Amendment in the present context. Prof. Gunaratne stressed that Sri Lankan model should be a home-grown one, adding that Indian model should not be imposed on Sri Lanka.

“India is organized on the basis of ethno-linguistic states. Sri Lanka is too small to do that. The Sri Lankan model should be that everyone should be able to live at anyplace preserving their own cultural and ethnic identities. India’s solution is good for India. It is not conducive or healthy for our country,” he said.

He also stressed that laws should be formulated to hinder persons with terrorist links who still have terrorist ideas coming to Parliament.

Prof. Gunaratne also stressed that Sri Lanka in its foreign policy should pay attention towards not only strengthening relationship with New Delhi, but also building an equally friendly relationship with Tamil Nadu.

“We have pursued a policy of friendship to all and enmity to none. This policy should continue. But Sri Lanka should establish special relationship with India. Tamil Nadu is as important as New Delhi.

It is important to build our relationship with DMK and AIDMK, two main parties in South India. We should also engage with small political cum social movements in Tamil Nadu such as the parties of Nedumaran, Vaiko, Seeman and Thirmularan. They have a very wrong impression of Sri Lanka” he said.

“The economy of the North grew at 22 per cent, while the rest of the country at 6 percent. The first stage should be physical infrastructure, but now the NGOs, government and the private sector should play crucial roles socially, economically, politically and psychosocially to link the North with the South.

The biggest damage the LTTE did was not the killing of people or destroying the physical infrastructure, but its spread of ideology of prejudice and suspicion.

We have to rebuild the trust between communities. More than devolving power in the periphery what is important is to devolve power in the centre,” he said.

“In the present context of Sri Lanka, the 13th Amendment itself is irrelevant.”

” it was enacted to facilitate the LTTE to enter mainstream politics, adding that EPRLF, EROS, PLOT, TELO, etc all entered mainstream politics through it.”

Furthermore, he says …

“India is organized on the basis of ethno-linguistic states. Sri Lanka is too small to do that. The Sri Lankan model should be that everyone should be able to live at anyplace preserving their own cultural and ethnic identities. India’s solution is good for India. It is not conducive or healthy for our country,” he said.

We are happy to have the esteemed professor join now the vast majority of patriots who have been saying this for DECADES!

The ethno-linguistic organization of India will ultimately lead to its disintegration. The growing ethno-linguistic warfare between Assam and Nagaland right now is further proof of that.

Sri Lanka should not hoist upon its own head the same crown of thorns that India is suffering from, blessed as Sri Lanka is with a size small enough to make a federal structure of government both unnecessary and irrelevant.

The situation today is that the TNA wants the Northern Province to be an EXCLUSIVE Tamils-Only preserve, while SHARING the rest of Sri Lanka through “Sri Lankan citizenship” that they barely acknowledge and honor.

That must not be allowed. The Provincial Council system under the 13th Amendment is what will allow them to achieve it. The TNA’s ULTIMATE GOAL has not veered ONE IOTA from the GOAL OF EELAM it pursued vociferously and vigorously in the days when the late unlamented Sun God ruled the Northern Province, and the TNA served him him as the LTTE proxy in Colombo.

Why are we still DEBATING this OBVIOUS issue? The 13th Amendment and the Provincial Council System is a dagger pointed at the heart of the territorial integrity and future economic progress in our Motherland.

With India itself, under the Narendra Modi’s new BJP Govt, recognizing its culpability for inciting separatism within Sri Lanka (vide Dr. Subramaniam Swamy’s recent remarks in Colombo) and willing to MAKE AMENDS to establish amicable relations with Sri Lanka, Sri Lanka should SEIZE the DAY and …

REPEAL the 13th Amendment, DISSOLVE the Provincial Councils, Ethnically Integrate all of Sri Lanka, not just the South of the Country!

CARPE’ DIEM, I say! Ask not for whom the bell tolls … it tolls for our Motherland of Sri Lanka

………Prof. Rohan Gunaratne at special lecture in Parliament: Home-grown solution best for Sri Lanka

By Sandasen Marasinghe and Disna Mudalige
DailyNews.lk
August 22, 2014

In the present context of Sri Lanka, the 13th Amendment itself is irrelevant, Expert on International Terrorism Prof. Rohan Gunaratne said.

He was making a special lecture on “India under Modi: A turning point in Indo-Lanka Relations” at the Parliamentary complex yesterday. The event was organized by the Sri Lanka Parliamentary Journalists’ Association with the coordination of the Department of Government Information.

Responding to a question by a journalist on the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, he said it was enacted to facilitate the LTTE to enter mainstream politics, adding that EPRLF, EROS, PLOT, TELO, etc all entered mainstream politics through it.

He said now is the best time to reflect on the suitability of 13th Amendment in the present context. Prof. Gunaratne stressed that Sri Lankan model should be a home-grown one, adding that Indian model should not be imposed on Sri Lanka.

“India is organized on the basis of ethno-linguistic states. Sri Lanka is too small to do that. The Sri Lankan model should be that everyone should be able to live at anyplace preserving their own cultural and ethnic identities. India’s solution is good for India. It is not conducive or healthy for our country,” he said.

He also stressed that laws should be formulated to hinder persons with terrorist links who still have terrorist ideas coming to Parliament.

Prof. Gunaratne also stressed that Sri Lanka in its foreign policy should pay attention towards not only strengthening relationship with New Delhi, but also building an equally friendly relationship with Tamil Nadu.

“We have pursued a policy of friendship to all and enmity to none. This policy should continue. But Sri Lanka should establish special relationship with India. Tamil Nadu is as important as New Delhi.

It is important to build our relationship with DMK and AIDMK, two main parties in South India. We should also engage with small political cum social movements in Tamil Nadu such as the parties of Nedumaran, Vaiko, Seeman and Thirmularan. They have a very wrong impression of Sri Lanka” he said.

“The economy of the North grew at 22 per cent, while the rest of the country at 6 percent. The first stage should be physical infrastructure, but now the NGOs, government and the private sector should play crucial roles socially, economically, politically and psychosocially to link the North with the South.

The biggest damage the LTTE did was not the killing of people or destroying the physical infrastructure, but its spread of ideology of prejudice and suspicion.

We have to rebuild the trust between communities. More than devolving power in the periphery what is important is to devolve power in the centre,” he said.

Well said GR. It is GOOD to put this on notice to ALL world powers (66 countries this time).

Islamic terrorism is ALIVE in SL and is certainly a MASSIVE threat. Nip the dirt in the bud NANTHIKADAL STYLE.

He very clearly identifies the ROOT CAUSE of the problem.

“In a paper published in the latest issue of the US Defence Department’s journal “Prism”, Sri Lanka’s Defence Secretary, Gotabaya Rajapaksa, has reiterated his belief that Islamic terrorism poses a threat to the island nation.

Since the LTTE’s defeat, some of the Muslim groups in Lanka have begun to engage in activities that go “far beyond self-protection”, he said in the journal brought out by the Center for Complex Operations (CCO).

“There is information that some of these groups have even tried to link up with global Islamic terrorist organisations. This is a situation that requires careful monitoring,” Gotabaya said. “Some Islamic groups in Lanka have started to establish ties with LTTE-linked agents to create further problems,” he further said.

According to Gotabaya, the increasing insularity of Lanka’s ethnic groups is at the root of the problem. “Rather than identifying themselves on the basis of nationality, the communities of Sri Lanka have begun to identify themselves on the basis of ethnicity or their religion. The cross-border links that can arise as a result of such insular ethnic or religious identification are also troublesome,” he said. “There are some foreign groups that wish to encourage Lankan Muslims to identify themselves more with the global Muslim community, thereby reducing their integration within Lanka.” The increasing insularity and cohesion amongst minority ethnic groups has also led to the emergence of hard line groups from the majority community, the top Lankan security official observed, NIE reports.”

7. Jaffna district is TAMILS only. Batticaloa district is TAMIL ONLY. Mulativu district is Tamil only. Mannar district is Tamil only. Kilinochchi district is Tamil only.

8. For Hindus, religious stuff is IMPORTED from Endia. For Muslims religious stuff is imported from Saudi. For Christians, religious stuff is imported from the west. Naturally they are DIVIDED.

9. There are separate universities for separate ethnic groups. Jaffna is for Tamils. South Eastern university is for Muslims. These have become BREEDING GROUNDS of INBREEDING RACISM.

10. There are even political parties exclusively for racial groups! TNA, TULF are for Tamils. SLMC, ACMC are for Muslims. JHU and BBS are for Sinhalese.

With everything creating divisions, how can SL people be united?

First step to unify SL, SCRAP that damned 13 amendment and make Sinhala the ONLY OFFICIAL LANGUAGE. Don’t give Tamil the status of national or official language. If we can’t do that, we don’t deserve to be UNIFIED.

I know one thing and want to warn…. In the event if President MR or defence Secretary GR were taken to international Courts, that will be the darkest day in Sri Lanka’s history darker than black July in 1983.

Tamil politicians those who are pushing for this with the aid of die-ass-pora and LieTTE left outs should organise to pack all the Tamils from Sri Lanka to TN before that day…

You’d better give your contract to people smuggling department of LieTTE to change the destination to TN.
You do not need a curfew with holiday for Police similar to what JRJ did… This is against the Rana wiruwo who gave their lives to the country against the barbarian LieTTE… They lost their lives by going to save Tamil civilians. But none of these so called innocent Tamil civilians are coming forward to defend our Army… How pathetic is this situation.

If TNA and NGO Dollar hungry teams pursue this UN initiated enquiry, and if our President is prosecuted…. I am waiting for that day so we will solve the Separatist Tamil problem for ever…

Perhaps, US wants this to happen.. Who knows!! Our President will not mind facing death penalty for the bogus claims made by Pillay Nona, if the problem is going to solve back home. They both are true patriots, wants Sri Lanka as one country, similar to what King Dutu Gamunu wished.

Hiranthe,
What king Mahendra doing is exactly what king Kavantissa was doing, that is getting away from Tamil Problem, as long as his regime could go on.
True, some one similar to king Dutugemunu existed before 2010, who was in the forefront of the war, not “in A/C Rooms ” as Gonseka said ( but he too was in a A/C room)” but this Dutugemunu went away after the war or died in the war.
Now we need a new one. So, what is happening is all the foxes have become Lions and talking big on trivial things.

Would Dutugemnumu have let the 13A continue together with the Dasa Maha Yodhayas such as Mervyns, Dumindas, Kudu Dimus , Ashrafs, Rajithas, Pierises, etc. ?

Military solution has been given and problem of mass murder , suicide, child abduction , child abuse, child soldier inhumanity has been defeated under the leadership of Mahendra Rajapakse. No doubt the whole nation appreciates this ( except UNpiers and Ltteirs).
But our beloved bugger became a blind man after acquiring Super Greed virus. We must cure him with appropriate therapy.

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